big hurt to get over the hump

at last mention, i had 15 of the 30 super short print 3-d sluggers cards in my 2003 upper deck vintage set build. having half of them was still more than enough for me to consider the set complete, as the whole reason i started building it in 2003 was because of the 1965 topps design that upper deck stole, and the 3d cards had nothing to do with that design.

still, i keep my eyes open, and recently added frank thomas' card

to my collection and set build.

i also just last week added chipper jones' card (not shown), so i am now down to a baker's dozen of needs. well, 13 for the set plus a second shawn green card for the dodger collection.

the collection marches on!

i'm still unsetisfied - 3d sluggers edition

count me among the many who are enamored with the 1965 topps design. that set is the only topps set i've completed from that decade, and it's because the pennants and the colors make it the most interesting to me - and it's been that way since i first saw the design at old man markgraf's comic and card store in the late 1970's. so, back in 2003, i was both excited and surprised to see 2003 upper deck vintage rip off the design. how were they able to do that? they had ripped off 1971 topps the year before (with another fantastic "vintage" set that i nearly completed) and they did not acquire the o-pee-chee rights until 2006, so i was and still am a bit baffled. it's worth noting that this was going on while fleer was also heavily "borrowing" from other companies' designs for their early 2000's tradition sets.

at any rate, i built the 2003 vintage set slowly but surely and considered it complete even though there is a hole in the middle of it. those short printed 3-d sluggers cards! cards 248-277 are lenticular cards featuring most of the big hitters of the day. you'd think with a 30 card set, that would mean one per team, but you would be wrong. there are multiple teams with two players, and so multiple teams with none. shawn green is the lone dodger representative, and i don't have one of those cards for my team collection, let alone the set.  not that i haven't been looking, though.

even as i consider the set complete (i have all of the 1965 design cards, after all), i still search for these semi-rare subset cards, and make a purchase when the price is right. here are the ones i picked up in 2025, or at least the last several months of the year:2003

adam dunn

having dunn in this set felt prescient, as he went on a run of five straight 40 homer seasons starting in 2004.

pat burrell

pat the bat had hit a career high 37 dingers the year before this card was issued, and he went on to hit 30+ in a few more seasons for the phillies. my favorite burrell stat is that he was 1 for 27 in world series play across two appearances, but has two rings to show for it.

jason giambi

2002 was giambi's first year with the yankees, and he hit 41 homers. he matched that total in 2003, and hit 30+ for them in three of the following five campaigns.

vladimir guerrero

if this were shawn green, i would feed the team collection first and the set second, which is the opposite of what my dad taught me when we were building sets in the early 1980's. with vladdy, i've fed the set and i am looking for another one of these for my pc.

derek jeter

checklist bias for jeets here. not a slugger, but upper deck couldn't leave him out.

alex rodriguez

textbook slugger. arod was the back-to-back american league home run champ when this card was issued, and he was on his way to a third straight title in his final season with the rangers. then he went to the yankees and continued to mash. good times.

in total, i have 15 of these 30 cards. the ones i am missing are 248 troy glaus, 249 luis gonzalez, 250 chipper jones, 254 frank thomas, 255 magglio ordonez, 257 ken griffey jr, 258 jim thome, 261 lance berkman, 263 mike sweeney, 264 shawn green, 266 mike piazza, 269 barry bonds, 270 mark mcgwire, 274 andruw jones, 277 albert pujols. some big names there that see their cards go for pretty big prices, so, my set will remain "complete" but i won't be happy about it.

base set bs

even with the proliferation of sets, it's always nice as a team collector to complete a team set. that's why it is so frustrating when card companies make it difficult to do so thanks to short printing or other shenanigans. 

i get that high numbers are scarce in many vintage sets, but there were no separate series in topps sets during the latter part of the 1970's, so why are short prints still a thing in topps heritage sets? sure, scarcity drives some collectors, but in a set like heritage it is just annoying. here's a 2024 topps heritage short print of freddie freeman

that i bought from a third party meaning topps gained no advantage from me by making this card and most of the other first 100 cards short prints. the freeman completes my team set and that makes me happy.

topps big league is another current set that uses short prints, thanks to its tiered checklist. i only have the foil and the "rare" blue foil cards in terms of upper tiered dodgers, including max muncy

and will smith

what makes this tiered system even more bs is that shohei ohtani has a regular base card but is also featured in the "super rare" red foil part of the checklist. nonsense.

back in the early 2000's, every card company was playing along with short prints as part of base sets. in some cases, like with 2002 upper deck diamond connection, these cards were numbered as seen on the danny mota and jose diaz cards below

there are a bunch of these and i am nowhere near a complete dodger team set for this release. i am somewhat closer with 2002 upper deck sp authentic now that i have this jose diaz card

but being three cards closer isn't really enough to make me go out and track down the other three cards. two of those cards are autographed which is a whole other level to base set abuse.

bowman and topps chrome were some of the notable offenders of this trend, along with other upper deck sets like 2007 spx which included this delwyn young rookie signatures card 

as a base card.

and, it hasn't just affected me as a team collector. i've only attempted to complete one topps heritage set - 2001 - and i consider it complete even though i don't have many of the high number short prints. and then there is the case of 2003 upper deck vintage. i've long considered my set to be complete as i have all the regular cards and short prints, other than the super short printed 3-d sluggers. i have several of them, but not all. 

most recently, i was able to add carlos delgado's card

but most of the others are usually priced beyond my interest level. these should have been inserts!

i like shiny cards and i like numbered cards and i like autographed cards. i just don't like them as base cards.

hof benefits

i suppose it's no surprise that with todd helton joining the hall of fame that i would see some of his cards pop up on ebay. i moved a couple of adrian beltre cards around the time of the induction myself, and i am sure that other folks had the same idea.

luckily for me, one seller decided to part with this 2003 upper deck vintage helton card

which comes from the short printed 3-d sluggers subset. while i count my 2003 ud vintage set complete without all of the 3-d cards, i do like to add them when the price is right.

for whatever reason (lack of interest in rockies cards?), this one was won with a single bid and my collection is one card closer to a goal that will probably never be reached.

if you are wondering, i have a bunch of ichiro cards that will probably see the market in january when the class of 2025 is announced!

outslugged

even though i was perplexed at how they managed to produce a set using topps' 1965 card design, i was on a mission to complete upper deck's 2003 vintage when it was released. at some point, i realized that right in the middle of the set there were about 30 short printed "3-d sluggers" cards featuring some of the game's best hitters. as a result, i consider my set to be complete even though i am missing the vast majority of those 3-d cards.

i still look from time to time to see if any of the cards i need are available, but they usually have pretty high buy it now prices attached to them. once in a while, however, i find them for cheap-ish. here's manny ramirez's 3-d sluggers card

that i bought for $4 shipped. and then i found jeff bagwell's card

on ebay with a $2.99 buy it now after establishing a saved search, and sammy sosa's card

soon followed at just over $6 shipped.

most recently, i added larry walker's card 

for about the same as the sosa.

i had also recently purchased barry bonds' card via sportlots, but the seller failed to include it with the shipment and i got a refund rather than the card.

with this recent activity, i am still 23 cards short of completing the set, although i continue to consider it complete even without all of the 3d cards.  there were 3-d cards in 2004 upper deck vintage as well, but i didn't bother trying to complete the full set. instead, i just focused on the dodgers.

while i've had the 2004 team set complete outside of the 3-d sluggers cards for a long time, i only recently sought out jeromy burnitz

and shawn green

to fully complete the set. it turns out that the 2004 3-d sluggers cards are easier to come by than their 2003 counterparts so i should have added them to the collection sooner.

the tradewinds have been blowing

today was the trading deadline.  the non-waiver trading deadline, to be precise.  there's no deadline on trading cards, but there probably is a proper timeframe for posting about those trades. i may have missed the boat on some of these.

not really a trade in the traditional sense, but i did trade a small amount of money for some cards as part of colbey's cardboard collections affordable breaks.

the first one featured 1994 pacific, and i chose the dodgers which netted me some nice cards including jody reed

who is turning two on the back

my assigned team was the blue jays, which resulted in another back side double play with roberto alomar's card

two alomars for the price of one.

the other affordable break i joined featured 2002 upper deck diamond collection and 2003 upper deck 40 man.  i wound up with a card from 2003 upper deck vintage update (included in packs of 40 man) of current manager dave roberts

unfortunately, doc's card came with a badly dinged corner.

it turns out that i already had a complete team set of 2003 40 man - it's 2002 40 man that is lacking in my collection. oh well, it was an affordable break after all.  here's jolbert cabrera

he was the first dodger to wear number 6 since 1982, and it signaled to me that the dodgers were giving up on steve garvey as a hall of famer.  it made sense as his 15 years on the ballot had expired without him being voted in by the bbwa, but it still kinda sucked to see number 6 back on the field.

perhaps the beginning of jim tracy's affinity for players named ja(y)son, here's jason romano

cards like that, featuring a guy who played in 37 games as a dodger and hit .083 in that time, are why i like sets such as 40 man.

finally, here's adrian beltre

getting cards of beltre as a dodger in the mail remind me that he is the one that got away.

mark hoyle sent me some cards, including this derek jeter double play turn

on a 2006 upper deck national card.  it inspired me to add a couple more double play cards to my collection, such as this 2005 upper deck khalil greene card

and this 2016 topps photo variation xander bogaerts card.

back to the trades, tom from angels in order sent me some dodgers.  you don't see 1985 donruss on the blogs much, so here's dave anderson's card

i think that is sid bream in the background.

hey kids! you too may become a big leaguer - alfredo griffin made it, and look at his swing on this 1991 fleer ultra card

plus he's rocking the little league hat-under-helmet look.

i needed this 2016 topps update walmart rookie insert of kenta maeda

if topps starts using the 1988 design in archives before 1978 i will assume that 1978 will never be used.

mr haverkamp came through with some needed 1982 fleer stamps, including the fernando/warren spahn stamp, bill russell, jerry reuss, and burt hooton

plus some bay area dusty baker cards for my post-dodger pc of johnnie b.

fleer and mother's cookies!

jon at penny sleeve for your thoughts reached out with some 2017 topps buybacks

two for the dodgers binders and one for the davey lopes post-dodger pc.

johnny's trading spot provided some great cards including two fleer greats of dodger great duke snider - 2000

and 2004

recycled photo, obviously.

tim, known as tshenson in your comment section, sent a bunch of dodgers in exchange for indians which included a 2016 topps gypsy queen corey seager rookie

and a 1994 sports illustrated for kids mike piazza card

that is a complete team set in and of itself.

thanks to all for the great cards!

i also need to mention that bo at baseball cards come to life sent me some 2002 topps 206 for my set build, although i forgot to scan the cards. thanks bo!

i've still got some trade bounty from nick at dime boxes, matt at bob walk the plank, and julie at a cracked bat to show off (plus a one-card pwe from mr. haverkamp), so i'm not done thanking everyone yet...